Catching Up

Where do I begin? The rest of November just flew right by me and took most of December with it so now, in the final few days of 2010, I'll catch up by summing up what happened since I came back from Paris.

Hives (Nov. 20-27)
Six days after I stepped foot off the plane, I had my first (and worst) hives episode from as far back as I can remember and at that point, hell broke loose. I was MISERABLE!!! Eight days of pure misery and agony. When no OTC medication worked for me, I finally gave in and went to York Central Emergency (Nov 24). Had my first IV (and hopefully last because it hurt!) and first taste of what it's like to be shot in the ab with adrenaline. Ouch~! I was dismissed after 2.5hrs of IV with a prescription for 3 antihistamines. Sigh, between taking Benadryl, Reactine, Prednisone and Zantac, I was pretty much a walking zombie for the rest of the week. Turned off the heat at home because it was causing the hives to flare up more so 文生 and I were in the cold until the allergy doctor told me it was okay to turn it back on (Dec. 02). The doctor told me since I was on Prednisone that I couldn't do a skin test so he sent me off to a lab to have a blood test done, then rescheduled me for the skin test in late January. He reassured me that the hives WILL come back in the meantime. GREAT. "Just keep taking the Reactine for another 2 weeks", he told me. WONDERFUL.

UTI (Nov. 29 - Dec. 07)
If my life wasn't miserable enough, I got UTI too. I had suspected it coming so I drowned myself in cranberry juice for a few days and by the time I was at the allergy doctor's, I was pretty sure it has gotten to a point where I needed antibiotics. So at the second visit to the walk in clinic in the span of a week, I was put on Macrobid. FML.... like, really. I was soooo close in calling off the ...

10th Annual Oyster Sushi Party (Dec. 04)
At least the hives and the UTI were sort of under control. I was a walking wreak, but at least somewhat presentable. The party was lots of fun as always, greatest turnout since I wanted to 攪大佢 (30 people, including 7 kids!) with lots of food as it was potluck. Cindy ended up winning all the alcohol from the raffle. What a lucky girl, and she doesn't even drink! I had so much food left over that 文生 and I had enough to eat over the span of an entire week!! The food was great... I even got the sushi chefs at Taro to cut up the fish for temaki so it would be easier for us to handle. WIN!

Procter and Gamble Warehouse Sale (Dec. 05)
I woke up the next morning after the party and quickly did all my online stuff and even managed to catch a glimpse of RFD. Found out there was a P&G warehouse sale at the International Centre who were selling Tide liquid for $2 a bottle. Now, being the 師奶 that I am, I just had to go. I called up Meishan and met up with her there. I picked up quite a bit of stuff, including a nice portable back up battery charger BUT to my dismay, no Tide. People were buying them by the cases but unfortunately for Meishan and I, who both have HE washers, none for us. :( Boo. At least everything there was tax free. Still worth the drive in my opinion.

While at the warehouse sale, I got a follow-up call from the walk in clinic to see how I was doing. Wow, first time I got that kind of treatment from a doctor's office, let alone a walk in clinic. Nice.

Blog Makeover (Dec. 09)
I finally finished blogging about the Paris trip and since my blog looked the same since August 19, 2009, I decided to give it a little makeover. Took all of a few hours. At work. LOL.

黃子華棟篤笑20年娛樂圈血肉史2 @ Sony Centre (Dec. 11)
好好笑! because 黃子華 is just always 好笑. 文生 and I enjoyed ourselves at the show. I thought 大會 would have had his 嘩眾取寵 DVD for sale (like previous shows) but since this time the show wasn't for World Vision I had to buy the DVD elsewhere. 文生 and I watched 嘩眾取寵 on Sunday and we both found it be a tad better than this year's show.

第六次去廁所溫馨提示，呢個 show 有成兩個鐘頭，所以就要快啲去廁所。因為如果你係

個 show 嘅半路中途去咗個冇乜人嘅廁所嘅話，你唔怕......寂寞咩！

Wrapping Presents for Work (Dec. 13-17)
The entire week at work was spent packaging the 100+ Christmas gifts for our offices. I actually enjoyed putting them together; so festive! My office was totally transformed into the annual sweatshop/warehouse where boxes amongst boxes of panettone, nougat bars, biscotti, etc etc were stuffed into. At one point I had 26 cases of red wine, all wrapped up in gold foil, creating a gold fortress that surrounded my desk. 場面真壯觀.

Baking 101 @ Meishan's (Dec. 15)
While packing gifts I had noticed a burning smell and after some investigation, we found out a new boiler was installed in the building. That day I remember I had a late lunch of pasta with cheddar cheese. Burning smell plus late lunch plus stuffy office full of presents = bad. I felt sooo dizzy lunch came up. TWICE. It was baaaad. Especially when all the garbage cans in my office were full. Sigh. Add to my pity for myself being sick. After my second round of barfiness, I still decided to go to Mei's for the bake date she set up. I cheated and bought Pillsbury gingerbread dough. It was good! Tinlop made shortbread cookies and Cindy made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. We started so late, Meishan didn't even get a chance to make her recipe. The night was labelled Baking 101 because both Tinlop and Cindy had no clue what they were doing, LOL.

Dinner with the Upper Village Gang (Dec. 16)
Mario decided to take us out for "nice" Chinese food so Larry picked 名門金宴. LOL~! I wasn't expecting to go there and we sure 斬到老細一頸血. There were 11 of us including Meishan and the bill was well over 7 舊 including gratuity. 老細好有品地給了 1 舊水貼士. O 晒嘴. Actually, not really because 老細 is always quite 闊佬.

Hives - Part 2 (Dec. 17)
Woke up to more hives after 4 days of being off Reactine. Since I had ran out after my last course, I popped a couple of Benedryl and was a walking zombie all day. I managed to pick up some more Reactine from 姐夫 right before heading into Pickering with Larry for a business related mini Christmas Party. l was back on 20mg per day per 姐夫. I'm thinking, why me? At this point, I'm starting to wonder if I'm allergic to shrimp and lobster since I had it for dinner the night before at 名門金宴. Sobs...

Greenpark Christmas Party (Dec. 18)
Being smart, I stayed away from all shrimp at the Greenpark party. As usual, we had a great time and ate lots of great food. Honourable mentions were definitely the veal chop and the specialty coffee at the end with all the whipped cream. YUM!! and of course... open bar. Kwaakakakakaka!!!

Now, only one more day before the Christmas break...

Au Revior Paris!

I couldn't sleep much last night for some odd reason and was up at 7:45a this morning to get ready to go home! We checked out of our hotel at 8.30a and decided to take a taxi to the airport. We thought since our Paris transit passes expired yesterday, we'd split the taxi cost amongst us and the difference was for our peace of mind of not having to fuss about not getting there on time. Plus, we had asked the hotel reception the night before how much it'll cost us approximately and were told about 15€. OMFG, the taxi ride was f'n expensive! I mean, did I mention it was *^$#*&$#*^$ EXPENSIVE?? Like, with a capital F? Instead of our anticipated 15€, it was more like 52€!! Like FML!! After 3 disgruntled passengers got off the taxi, I whipped out my ipod and read the freaking Frommer's guidebook for the umteenth time to see if I've missed their "taxi tips" anywhere. Nope, no where to be seen. Apparently, there are 3 "zones" and depending on time of day of travel, there are also a 3 different rates. Little did we know, we were classified in RATE C (which of course is the most expensive rate at something outrageous like 1,31€ per click or something like that, being the rate for travel on a Sunday to the airport). On top of which we were charged 2€ for the use of the trunk for our luggage, a "customary" 15% gratuity, AND a freaking pick up fee!!! So our supposedly $22.50 CAD taxi ride became a raping $78.00 CAD!!! I'm sure you can tell we were NOT happy campers at that point.

We checked ourselves in, grabbed a bit of a bite to eat (I only had a croissant because now I'm broke from the taxi ride, LOL), and browsed the duty free shop for good buys. My spirits lifted a bit when I noticed the really cheap wines and champagnes! I picked up a bottle of Moet Brut while Meishan happily snatched up a "heavily discounted" bottle of Dom Perignon. At 41€ and 119€ respectively, how can we go wrong? Well, actually we can. We didn't realize we were both allowed two bottles each so we only bought one. I wanted a bottle of Dom too!! Oh well, better safe than sorry I suppose. We lined up at 10:30a to board what we thought was a plane only to find out that it was a shuttle bus that took us from the gate to the middle of a runway. We had to board the plane from outside. Talk about tacky. At least the plane took off on time. Sigh, our last day is rainy and miserable too! Bye bye Paris!

Nov.14.10 12:21p (Toronto time)

Almost home la! I'm just having a sweet potato salsa wrap and listening to the pod. Earlier I took a quick nap after having a lunch of spinach fettuccine with chicken in gravy and watching Karate Kid. My, Jaden Smith is pretty good.

Parapluie Lacking

What a yucky day today!! Les Miserables we were for the entire wet, rainy Saturday. Running on almost no sleep, we all got up at 11:00a to tackle our final drippy, touristy filled day. Despite looking out the hotel window and declaring that it is incredibly windy and wet out, I took the chance and brought along my camera. Good thing the camera bag comes with a "rain coat".

We took the Métro (subway) out to Opéra and found ourselves with lunch (or brunch or whatever) at a cafe chain called Brioche Dorée where for the first time since I've step foot onto French soil, was "forced" to carry a conversation entirely in French. Yes! and they understood it! Hah! I enjoyed my pain au chocolat, tartlette framboise and moyen latte machiato that much more. =)

After lunch, we walked around the area for a bit, then headed off to the Place de la Concorde, an Egyptian obelisk that's supposed to be the oldest manmade object in Paris. With the rain coming down much harder, it was pretty much a "oh look, take photo, let's leave" kind of thingy. Sigh. Stupid rain.

We then proceeded with our "spectacular" 3.2km walk down toward Champs-Elysées, where we did a bit of "shopping" (it was more like window shopping although Tinlop did manage to pick something up at H&M). At the end of the Yorkville of Paris was the Arc de Triomphe, the greatest triumphal arch in the world. Mind you, it looks much like any other damned arches I've seen elsewhere (ie Rome, Paris, CNE - lol!) but then again, what do I know?

As suggested by the Frommer's guide to Paris, we then dripped our way over to La Tour Eiffel to see it in daylight where of course, Tinlop would just not stop singing 失落於巴黎鐵塔下. That song is soooo 上腦.



By then, the wind and rain really started to bother me and the three of us didn't care to do much but rest up and perhaps grab dinner so back to Le Carrousel (at Louvre, yes again) we went for a Parisien McD combo, a macaron, and most importantly, to the Apple Store to charge ma pod!! Did I mention the washrooms are free to use there? Free washrooms FTW!!

After devouring my last potato wedge from my McD combo, we walked around the Virgin store (which is very much like our Indigo) and bought the Pierre Hermé Macaron book. It's entirely in French, but I couldn't resist getting it for 30€ after finding out it costs $104 on amazon.ca. Mmm, can't wait to try the recipes!

We made a stop at the local supermarket to buy some pate, ham and crackers to snack on before getting back to the hotel, shortly after 9:00p to pack and get ready to bid adieu to Paris!

Un Jour Dans La Ville Romantique de Paris

Nov.13.10 4:57a

Just about to go to sleep after 6+hrs of girl talk and gossip! Still jet lagged? Or is it the tea at dinnertime? Maybe has something to do with the fact that we didn't get up until after 11am today!

Our first full day in the romantic city of Paris started kinda late. Funny how this trip is entirely "un" frantic. I'm pretty positive that the weather has everything to do with that! We were lucky to just have a slight drizzle here and there today so I was able to bring out the camera. I suppose that is a win. Not being able to take photos while away on vacation in a city worth using 12375124383 rolls of film really sucks, you know?

We stopped off first at Musee de Louvre at about 12:30p. Seeing we were hungry, we decided to eat lunch before heading in to see Ms. Mona. We walked a good half hour, trying not to get lost and went to La Pied de Cochon for our 3hr lunch. Omg, 3 hrs !! Had their famous oh so yummy yet oh so salty soupe d'oignon, pig feet platter equipped with tail, snout & ear, oh so fat but oh so yummy bone marrow straight from the big bone, 3 types of fresh sorbet (apple, lime, strawberry) and a huge creme brulee. Very different from the Montreal version of the eatery but definitely good onion soup! Very expensive lunch though. At that point we decided we'd be frugal for dinner, lol.

After lunch we went to check out the Cathedrale de Notre-Dame. Nothing compared to the St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, but it's the same idea. We strolled along the streets a bit before we decided to head back to Louvre for the evening admission special of 6€! That's a wonderful savings of 3€ per person! Although it's still not enough to cover the bottle of water we had for lunch :(

At the entrance to Louvre, we stopped at the Apple Store (how conveniently located) to charge my pod, which was running very low on juice, since we weren't prepared to come to Paris!! LOL!

Spent a few hours at Louvre and damn, Ms. Mona is not that impressive... I still think she's fake. By the time we got to the sculptures area of the museum, Tinlop and I were so tired, we left Meishan to go off by herself to take photos of what seem like every naked 16 feet tall man and woman portrayed in a sculpture. Sigh, I'm so not artsy...

Dinner time rolled along and we ended up at a Chinese food restaurant (called Auberge du something, LOL) since the cafe we wanted to try only opened for tea. We were definitely happy to be able to communicate freely with the servers there as they all spoke Cantonese! Win! What's even better is that it wasn't totally chop suey, we actually had 菜心! Only thing we couldn't get over was that Meishan's hot water cost 3.2€. Yikes!!

We got back to the hotel by 11:30p and after hours and hours of chatting, I'm now off to bed. (5:18a)

Evening stroll along the streets of Paris

La Tour Eiffel, La Tour Eiffel ...

La Tour Eiffel, La Tour Eiffel 沒法抵償的心, 已失落於巴黎鐵塔下

Nov.10.10 - 7:58p

How 擺烏龍 is this? Our original last minute Vegas trip just turned into a Paris vacation! Our plan was to head to sunny Las Vegas for the weekend and catch a few shows and soak in some sunshine. Since we "couldn't get on the Vegas flight", Meishan, Tinlop and I decided last minute to fly to Paris and 食個 lunch. Tee hee. This flight is pretty empty, with Mei and I each hogging an entire row of seats to ourselves. Boarding was supposed to have started at 7:15p but for some reason, we were just let on. Now we're patiently waiting for the plane to take off. (8:04p)

Nov. 10.10 - 10:48p

Wah wah wah! 細V wasn't kidding when she said she was crying watching Toy Story 3. I was bawling! Dinner was served shortly after I woke up from a nap at around 9ish, and since 電視撈飯 is the only way to go on a flight, I decided to watch Toy Story 3. Great movie.

Dinner was a really boring penne with chicken. Can't complain I guess, since it was actually semi palatable. It's actually going to be quite a while before we land so I might as well try and sleep. (10:56pm)

Nov.12.10 - 1:21am Paris time

We're now back at the hotel after a bit of wet Paris goodness.

To recap the rest of the day, I threw up twice before landing because I actually thought I could get away with not taking any Gravol. That was a stupid idea. Landed at Aéroport Paris-Charles de Gaulle pretty much on time at 10a-ish and walked a very, very long walk before getting out of airport. OMG, it's cold!!! and wet...eeek! Bought our subway passes and took the subway out to our hotel, which we didn't have much difficulty finding. Enroute, we encountered our first "subway performer" and got suckered into giving him money. We had no clue, LOL~! Mind you, we had no euro either, so we gave him US change. He wasn't too pleased with that, haha! They're everywhere though. After the first encounter, we knew better and didn't bother giving out any more money. In one day, we saw 2 singers, 1 clarinet player and 1 accordion duet. These "performers" are pretty aggressive! I wonder if they have real jobs.

Had McD's for lunch after getting some euro at freaking 1.5. Much better than Rome I guess...so expensive! Especially when I know the exchange rate is only 1.38. Ripped off once again, but at least I wasn't raped. We saw the Arc de Triomph and la Tour Eiffel in the dark and in the rain. We'll go back tomorrow to see it in daylight after we visit the Louvre.

Ate dinner at a cafe (Cafe Kleber) for 18euro (tomato & cheese salad and onion soup only...) but really wanna try Au Pied de Cochon tomorrow!

Before heading back to the hotel, we stopped at a "convenience store" that they called a marche to grab a very yummy (and relatively inexpensive) peach flavoured Schwepps! Yum! Chor'd some dee to kill time and laughed hysterically at Meishan's attempt to put on body lotion but later found out it was actually Dove body wash. LOL~!

Now I'm exhausted. (1:52a)

Another 細V Moment

I had another 細V moment this morning as I rummaged through my bottles amongst bottles of stuffs underneath my bathroom sink trying to find a new bottle of shampoo. Guess what I found?? Yep, 4 bottles of conditioner. No where near V's 9 bottles, but the idea is...no shampoo to match those bottles. Geez. Talk about 細V精神: 與你生活息息相關. LOL~! 好在係間唔中啫. =D

On a Cold November Night...

I crave poutine.

Again.

Municipal Elections 2010

I haven't really followed the Elections this time around (not that I did previously, lol) but one thing for sure: Ms. Hazel McCallion will probably be mayor of Mississauga until she lies on her deathbed!! Which is probably a good thing for those who live in 'Sauga (like 細V) since I heard the 89-year-old's the greatest mayor (and longest serving in Canada, at 12 terms) despite the negative publicity this time around.

and who is Rob Ford? Don't think I'll recognize him even if my life depended on it. LOL~! The Ford campaign sounds promising but really, I'll believe it when I see it all happen. Hopefully TO will become a better city and less expensive to live in.

Incumbent Sandra Bussin lost her seat for Ward 32 and somehow I feel good that she did. Although she's been school trustee and then councilor for as long as I remember (since days of elementary school), I didn't know how much of a biatch she is outside of her work! Saw her at Waterview a few years back when she attempted to buy a condo. What a snob!

As for good ol' RHill, I have to now remember this name: Dave Barrow. I won't remember, LOL. Especially since I only found out 10 minutes ago I live in Ward 5. Dave who?

and Vaughan is no longer run by Linda Jackson... but then again, I don't know who she is either. If it wasn't for work relations that allowed me to know the name, I wouldn't. Now I have to remember Maurizio Bevilacqua. Heck, I can't even pronounce it. Somehow, I keep seeing baklava. LOL, I think I'm hungry.

But the real O-嘴, 跌眼鏡, jaw-dropping result is finding out that 廖立暉 won the seat for Ward 3. OMG, he calls himself 暉哥 Fei Gor on his website. Gag. I guess the elections really is a popularity contest, huh?

With my complete ignorance, I'm now kinda glad I didn't vote yesterday. Or maybe I should have. Then again, I didn't get a voting card nor did I know where to go. See, I only found out I live in Ward 5 10 minutes ago...

To Keep or Not To Keep?

Sigh... I've been wanting to get the Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant since before it came out several months ago. Not being able to justify spending an additional $30 a month for data was basically the only thing that was holding me back. Lately, seeing 6 of my 8 co-workers with iPhone 4's, I started thinking about the sleek and sexy rival of the Vibrant too. Of course, by this time stupid Bell had already discontinued their 6GB data plan and for $25 you can only get a measly 500MB. Now I really want the Samsung, only to find out they won't let me upgrade until next year! Doh! >.<

I thought I'd satisfy my 購買欲 by getting the best of both worlds: iPod Touch 32GB for now and then SGS later next year when it's time to upgrade. Somehow, after making the $360 purchase, I don't exactly feel excited. Maybe it's the Apple Store restocking fee that's turning me off. Sigh... the big question now is: to keep, or not to keep? Haven't even taken it out of the box yet.

Lychee Panna Cotta

荔枝奶凍 - 好好味~!

Ever since having the lychee panna cotta at Inatei, I've been wanting to make it. I mean, how hard can it be? Between working the opening and keeping sane while doing so, I've managed to find time to make it twice! Both times turned out great! At least my co-workers tell me so. Made two batches each time since there are so many people at the site!

Whipped up 2 batches in no time at 3 in the morning, LOL~!

Lychee Panna Cotta
or rather, Milk Pudding (whatever~)

2 cups half and half cream (or for much creamier version, substitute 1 cup whole milk and 1 cup whipping cream)
1 cup lychee syrup (from the can)
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp sugar
2 tsp unflavoured gelatin

1. Sprinkle gelatin over lychee juice and let sit to soften, about 5 minutes.
2. Add vanilla to cream and heat on medium to a simmer. Add sugar and stir until dissolved.
3. Stir gelatin/lychee juice mixture into the cream and mix until gelatin is completely dissolved.
4. Halve 3 lychees and place in six 4 oz serving glasses. Alternatively, quarter them and put in twelve 2 oz shot glasses. Pour cooled mixture evenly into glasses and chill in refrigerator for at least 2 hours or overnight for best results.

Yummy~!!

I Need a Break

I finally realized that I can't do work marathons anymore, especially boring ones! Finding myself not able to wake up in the morning sucks. Plus I gotta shop for groceries (something I haven't done in 3 weeks), get a towel, replenish my face cream and toner, clean the bathroom sinks, pull the hair out of my vacuum cleaner, put all my summer clothes away, iron, and other miscellaneous things I have to do around the condo. Sigh...I have no time and/or effort to do any of it. 好頹...

Marathon, My Butt

Remnants of thoughts from the Richmond opening still cross my mind periodically and remind me how busy it is to do a broker reception. This time around, I was expecting a very busy opening (of course not to the extent of the Richmond one) but boy was I disappointed!! I haven't had a need to stay late at all...not even an hour after closing! Guess I should be happy?

Tomorrow sees Day 11 of my working streak (and I suppose the end of Round 1 of the workathon as I'll probably get Friday off) before starting all over again on Saturday. This weekend better be super busy so I can justify working...sigh...

Here's to the Start of a Month-Long Marathon

Working marathon that is.

Day 1 - 11am to 11pm (12hrs)
Day 2 - 11am to 1am (14hrs)

Day 3 will hopefully be no longer than 14 hours... but the days will only get longer starting with Day 4.

Here's to a new condo opening, haha~!

On another note, I'm glad I came home before the light show came on. Wobbling street lamps aren't exactly my kinda thing, ya know? Especially since you have to have it as a combo: lions and dingos coming down in sheets, wobbling street lamps, laser light show, flying cows... well not quite the cows but it sure looked like it could have picked up a few of them! I was pretty fascinated (and happy) at the fact that I'm in the comfort of my home watching this show when I noticed a small leak in the balcony door (crap!) and then a power surge that shut down my comp (doh!). I'm kinda glad it's over.

JP inspired!

Last night I finally got my act together and finished scrapping my Tokyo trip from July. I thought, with my opening coming up next week, 現在唔完成等到幾時? Done! I'll give myself a pat on the back since I finished the page in record time, haha~

Funny, people tell me once you come back from Japan, local JP food just doesn't taste the same so you'd end up having less of it since you have no comparison. Sigh... all I've been wanting (except the odd poutine craving, of course) is JP cuisine!! Had sushi more than enough times in the last 6 weeks, including 2 visits to Inatei in 8 days (hefty!).

Last week, I decided I wanted to make 銀だら西京焼き but didn't realize I had to marinate the cod for 3 days! The damn piece of frozen fillet cost me $12 (not even a pound of fish) and the sake I bought to marinate it was $10! Sigh...anything for good food I guess, keke. I finally yaki'd it on Saturday. It was a tad salty (over marinated at 4 days, haha) but tasted yummy! Polished off every little bit of it!

Sunday rolls along and I go out with Mar Mar, leaving 文生 at home to study, and I remembered that live scallops are on sale at T&T @ $5.99/lb! Being disappointed last time that T&T had a $5.99 scallop sale and all I saw in the damn tank was water, my hopes weren't exactly high as I marched up to the fish section. WAH! The tank was FULL! Kwaakakakka! I secretly tsk'd at the guy that was hogging the tank, but patiently waited (with an impatient look on my face) as he finished weighing his stupid scallops. Then there was this lady that was taking her sweet little time picking what, like 6 of them?!? Picked one up with tongs, gingerly handled it with 2 fingers, shook out water, decides it's not big enough, repeat the above... sigh. I thought to myself: 揀女婿咩! I went right up against the tank and decided, the hell with the tongs! Dove right into the water with bare hands and picked up 6 huge lively scallops (ah yes, they were clammed shut alright) and by the time I was done weighing, that lady was still picking!!! Sheesh! $20.01 for 6. Huge they are. Just as big as the ones I had way back when.

Kinda big eh? Filled up the all the space on my cutting board.

Miso ホタテ焼き was what became of these monsters. Boy I was a happy camper last night. Even the hour long cleaning (ya, for the 6 damn things) wasn't that bad. Had to double up on one of the shells during yaki-ing since all of them didn't fit on the pan, LOL!

Now I'm thinking about the green tea and lychee panna cottas I had at Inatei. I think I'll make them tomorrow...keke.

The Great Poutine Taste-Off!

I finally had the chance to satisfy my 2-month-long poutine craving by sinking my teeth into mounds off crispy Yukon Gold fries smothered in beefy gravy piled high with squeaky cheese curds. We're not talking some crappy New York Fries, Harvey's or KFC poutine here but da real thing!!! To make satisfying my craving totally worthwhile, I got not one, not two but THREE poutines from 3 different places for the ULTIMATE POUTINE TASTE-OFF! To my dismay, all the raved about poutineries are all downtown (which is the reason why my craving lasted 2 months) so it only made sense to try all of them at once, huh!

To start off, I drove 24km from work to my first destination: Poutini's House of Poutine (while I was there, I got myself a Grande decaf mocha frappucino with two pumps of raspberry syrup with whipped cream from the Starbucks next door. Yes, I can feeeel the fat forming already, LOL).

Poutini's $6.99 + tax = $7.90

Next, was a 5km drive through downtown TO on Dundas which to me, transformed into something I can hardly recognize anymore to my next stop: Smoke's Poutinerie (which happens to be just across the street from Filmore's, heh).

Smoke's $6.99 + tax = $7.90

Meishan and Tinlop went to pick up the last of the 3 poutines from Great Burger Kitchen conveniently located next to my former high school.

Great Burger Kitchen $5.25 + tax = $5.93

The result? A LOT of poutine.

Now let's get on with tasting notes.

Poutini's was unfortunately sitting out for over an hour by the time we were ready to eat it so I'm not sure if it's the lack of gravy to begin with or it magically evaporated but it was dry. Cheese curds were definitely the squeaky type (win!) and the fries were as expected. I grade it a 2/5. The gravy lost.

Smoke's was OMG salty! The fries were nicely seasoned and generously drenched in gravy, cheese curds were squeaky but the gravy! OMG the gravy was soooo salty my tongue must have stopped working! If it was 40% less salty this would have been the win. I give it 3.5/5.

Lastly, Great Burger Kitchen. Sadly, my tongue is now broken so the gravy (as generous as they are with it) is pretty much tasteless to me at this point. Cheese curds were lacking (I'm guessing they just use plain old mozzarella) so no squeakiness here. Sigh... only a measly 2/5. The cheese lost.

Conclusions: 文生 decided his arteries were being clogged as he chowed down the CHO; Tinlop likes Great Burger Kitchen; Cindy doesn't want anything to do with poutine in a loooooong time; Meishan and I both like Smoke's IF it wasn't so salty. I think I'm pretty much done with poutine for a while too. Or, back to KFC...

A Fantabulous Saturday!

As the title of this post suggests, my Saturday was fantabulous!!! With 文生 at school, I organized the annual watch-this-year's-HK-duck-show get-together, so we can scream and yell all we want to ourselves!

The day started with a bit of shopping and froyo eating at Hillcrest Mall with Meishan and Tinlop and then Faye Goo chiming in for lunch at 聯記 on Major Mac. Afterward, we went back to my place and baked! We made almond cranberry biscotti, fluffy pound cake and cranberry oatmeal cookies. While things were in the oven, we watched the HK Duck Show 2010. I must say, like Miss HK, the contestants are not getting any better by the year. More like the reverse happening, LOL Nonetheless, we had fun watching it (we always have fun watching it, especially in a large group). After the show, we brought back some growing up memories by playing a few interactive rounds of The Price is Right. By that time 文生 had come home from class so he locked himself in his room while we screamed some more in the living room. The day happily ended with a HUGE Italian dinner at Dante's (their tiramisu SUCKED ROCKS though!!).

Ahhh, good times!!

Summer's Coming to an End Already?!

Wow, I can't believe it's been a month since I came back from Tokyo. Why does time fly by so quickly anyway? It seem like only a short while ago that I finally finished scrapping my Hong Kong 2008 photos (but it's been 3 weeks already!!) and I thought scrapping my 3-day trip to Tokyo would be a breeze. Wah, I'm a month behind lor! I just hope it's not going to take me a year and a half to scrap the couple of pages!!

With the CNE opening last Friday and the week-long non-stop raining, I'm gradually feeling the end of summer. Bleh! Temperature hasn't been exactly hot either. Sigh... although it is more comfortable at 22C when it's not raining, I'd like the summer not to end so quickly. July/August always give me a "vacation" kind of mood but once September rolls along, it's the back-to-school season which = ewwww. That just means leaves will fall, then snow and then the winter blues. Just thinking about the looong winter months makes me shiver. Poopie!

On another note, I just spent the entire night killing fruit flies. Must have squished at least 15 of them bastards. Teaches them to eat up my cantaloupe :( 見一隻殺一隻!!

"Iced" Milk Tea

伙計!! 唔該!! 一杯熱啡, 一杯凍鴛鴦, 一杯奶茶...雪糕!!

繼上次嘅茉莉雪糕丶綠茶雪糕, 小芬又有新傑作: 港式奶茶雪糕!! 非常成功, 勁有奶味, 唔太甜. 同上次一樣咁多膽固醇, 不過冇用糖改用煉奶. 更加滑但係更加多脂肪呢! -_-"

睇見都想食!!

Meeting Marathon

嘩~!! 日日係咁開會、日日如是... 3 個鍾、5 個鍾... 又冇飯食!! 邊有咁多會開!! 最慘係自己嘢做唔完, 要 OT!!

慘慘慘!! 又係嗰個字: 厭!

Catch Up Time

Where do I start? I'm so behind on blogging it's not even funny. Been pretty busy at work and what can I say, laziness plays a big role too.

On July 10th, Karen, 細V, Gootoe and I finally made an attempt to go to Niagara on the Lake and complete that wine tour Karen and I've been talking about for months. It was a whole day trip, starting with breakfast at On the Twenty, then Cave Spring in Jordan, then Southbrook, 大山行, some lavender farm, Pilliteri, Stratus, then Tim Hortons (LOL), some little shops in Niagara on the Lake, then Peller and finally Inniskillin. We left Inniskillin just as they closed, at 6:00pm, and went to have dinner at The Keg overlooking the Canadian Horseshoe Falls. That was neat! After a short walk after dinner, we headed home. Good thing it was Karen that drove, otherwise I would have fallen asleep behind the wheel (like I did a few times when driving Gootoe home). Finally got home at 2:00am and passed out.

Ice and dessert wines were mainly the highlight of the tour, probably because no one really cared which wineries we visited and so I picked the ones I wanted to see. Southbrook is one I really like and ever since they've moved from their Major Mac and Bathurst location, I wasn't able to get the wines that the LCBO didn't carry. Their new vineyard and winery at NOTL is very modern but unfortunately, the front of their building looks like it's under construction with the blue "hoarding" around it. So much for design that I don't know how to appreciate, LOL.

I really liked the ultra modern look of Stratus, a smaller winery next to Jackson Triggs (we didn't even bother with JT). Nicole and Nathan had lots of fun chasing butterflies and running around in their vineyard.

Apparently, Pilliteri and Inniskillin both renovated so they don't really look like old fashioned cellars anymore. My favourite cabernet franc from Inniskillin was on sale so I just had to pick up a bottle!! Otherwise, I made sure I bought wines that weren't available at the LCBO/Wine Rack.

My 戰利品's:

1. 2008 Southbrook Triomphe Cabernet Sauvignon (organic)
   
2. Sonoma Smoked Olive Oil
3. 2006 Inniskillin Cabernet Franc ice wine
4. 2008 Stratus Riesling ice wine
5. Southbrook Cassis
6. Southbrook Blueberry
7. Southbrook Blackberry
8. 2005 Southbrook Vidal ice wine
9. 2004 Pilliteri Cabernet Franc ice wine
10. Vineyard Pantry Blue Cheese Dijon Mustard (front)
    

AC Style Kaiseki

Jul.25.10 - 4:52p
I am now on the plane enroute Calgary and guess where I'm sitting?? J class of course! Yes, that means I'm in executive first again!! Kwaakakkakka! Although the J Tour of Tokyo had to be cut short, I must say I'm not really disappointed to go home a day earlier. The weather is so hot and humid there that you really don't want to do anything but stay indoors. Anyhoo, we're going home baby! and in J class!!

This morning, I woke up at about 7:45a but stayed in bed until about 8:30a when I got up and started packing my stuff away. Tinlop and I wanted to grab some breakfast before heading to the airport so we went to Isetan again to see if we can grab something quick to bring to the airport. After some sampling again (haha, I like sampling) we decided to go to Family Mart for easy eats. I bought my first onigiri of this trip and ate it on the limousine bus ride to the airport. Taking the 11:40a bus, we arrived at the airport at 1:00p and shopped for a bit. Oh my, the airport is more like a mall than anything! 5 levels of shopping even before you get into the gates! I ended up buying some mochi that mui and I had in Kyoto, kanimiso for 文生 and some okashi for the office. Somehow, I don't really feel like buying anything for myself? Sigh...

I just ordered the in flight kaiseki dinner. Tinlop's been talking about it ever since he went to Tokyo with Cindy last year. Haahahah, I certainly do not believe it would even compare to the one we had last night but it'd be interesting to see what AC's interpretation of it is. (5:07p)

Jul.25.10 - 7:37p
Wow, I'm really sleepy....probably thanks to the Gravol I had to take. Funny how the air seem to be very turbulent today! The kaiseki dinner was actually very impressive! For an on flight meal, it's actually not bad at all! Too bad I couldn't finish all of it. With the 5 item appetizers I was getting pretty full already and was kinda glad they started clearing away the dishes when suddenly one of the FA's brought over another tray full of food! waaaahhh, I was getting nauseated from the turbulence and the smell of the beef actually made me kinda sick. So I had to take a Gravol just to be safe so now I'm super sleepy! I thought I'd finish the episode of 搜下留情 and take a nap and the FA brought over more food! aiya! The beef from the kaiseki was surprisingly tender and not at all dry. Cooked to a medium, it was definitely palettable. It's just too bad I only had room for one piece. I already skipped the cheese with crackers and the chocolate lava cake with ice cream so I think I'll have my fresh fruit bowl and then take a nappy. :) (7:45p)

Jul.25.10 - 12:03p Toronto time (Jul.26.10 - 1:03a Tokyo time)
I can see why one (the one in question is of course, me) can be so spoiled in first class. As soon as I dropped the seat down to its horizontal sleeping position, I passed out immediately and slept for 5 hours! How nice! I woke up about 40 minutes ago and seeing the FA's have started serving breakfast, decided to wake up and eat. Otherwise I would have just fallen asleep again! kekeke~ Having food means we're almost at our destination of Calgary. Breakfast was congee with an assortment of Japanese cold dishes, fruit, yogurt and a really nice flaky croissant. I actually finished everything except the two slices of grapefruit. Now I feel like a pig and want to nap again, hahahaha~~ Looks like we're going to land soon because the flight in charge just made an announcement. So much for napping... (12:10p)

後記: Of course the flight from Calgary back to Toronto was uneventful... and that concludes my Tokyo trip 2010!

懐石料理 FTW!!

Jul.25.10 - 1:01a
Dinner was sooo great that it deserves a total post by itself!!

So we left shortly after 6:00p to Sensoji temple again because tucked away in some side alley is a quaint Japanese style farmhouse that serves kaiseki ryouri 懐石料理!! OMG, ever since I started watching the 點解日本咁好玩's, I've always wanted to try kaiseki. Last time when I was in Osaka, I didn't get a chance to go but this time, I told myself I must! Thanks to the handy Frommer's guidebook, we easily found the really really nice place to have my absolute first kaiseki experience.

We wouldn't have been able to locate this restaurant if it wasn't for the recommendation from the guidebook since we'd not think to head into some back alley after visiting such a big tourist attraction. After the hour-long subway ride, we came up to Waentei-Kikko 和えん亭　吉幸 and peered at the sign that had two tags that read 18:30 and 20:00. We thought: darn, did we miss the seating? Not wanting to wait around doing nothing for 1.5 hours, we decided to open up the traditional Japanese sliding door to let the owner know to expect us later, only to find out the place was deserted except for 2 tables (yes this place has no glass windows)! Great, that means we can eat! The cute (and really really polite) hostess, who spoke very little English, came up to us and welcomed us warmly. She pointed out that the restaurant was set menu only and made sure we knew what we were up against. I was getting so excited already! We sat down on a traditional tatami たたみ mat and ordered the 9 course kaiseki meal. They have a 7 course and 9 course regular set and the same with fugu. Since I've already had fugu before, Tinlop didn't care for it and most importantly, since we didn't have reservations, we ordered the simple set instead. Waaaaah, service was so impressive and impeccable! Food was presented very very nicely, as expected, and the taste was absolutely phenomenal!! The highlight of the night was definitely the mini concert the host gave playing the shamisen 三味線, a 3-stringed instrument which (if I understood correctly) he had 40 years experience playing. Waaaaahhhh, that was a real bonus lor! What an awesome awesome experience! Just before the performance, the host came by and asked us where we're from and during his performance, he mentioned having guests from Canada and played us a "Canadian" tune, lol... it was "Happy Birthday", LOL!! We finished dinner (I was all smiles), took some pics with the host and hostess and left just shortly before 9:30p. I was really happy I had my chance to carry a couple of very broken J conversations during dinner and that's exactly why I like speaking to people who speak very little English so I am forced to spit out what I can in Japanese.

We went back to the hotel and after Tinlop had taken his 3rd shower for the day, we went out again at 10:45p to check out Shinjuku Nichome again. This time, there were way more people but after a drink (I didn't even finish mine), Tinlop suggested we leave and we did. We spent a total of 40 minutes there, including the travel time to and from the hotel, LOL!

I am now trying desperately to finish the plum wine that I opened yesterday. Somehow, I can't seem to see that bottom of that thing! Literally too, since the bottle is completely black and opaque. I think I'm going to go take a quick shower, finish the wine and then hit the sack, concluding my final night of my shortened stay in the monstropolis of Tokyo. (1:44a)

Harajuku et al.

Jul.24.10 - 4:59p
This morning Tinlop and I were wide awake by 7:30a but didn't leave the hotel until 10:00a since nothing would be open before then. After a bit of persuasion, Tinlop finally agreed to go to the Meiji Jingu Shrine 明治神宮 again. So off we go into the steamy Tokyo sauna toward Harajuku 原宿. Halfway during the walk into the shrine, I was already dripping wet from the sweat and good thing the walk was tree-lined! We saw a Japanese marriage ceremony take place so I snapped some photos along with the other busloads of nosy tourists. The Shrine was in the middle of a lot of green stuff so after we were done there, we had no where to go but to retrace our steps back out the way we came in. In a nutshell, that just means grumpy Tinlop, LOL.

We stayed in Harajuku for some window shopping and decided to have ramen for lunch! We stumbled across a ramen chain called Kyuusyu Jangara 九州じゃんがら and I had a really savoury pork bone soup based ramen with egg, chasiu, pork belly and mentaiko! Yum! All the while they were playing 女子十二樂坊, haha, 好好 feel wor!

After lunch saw more window shopping at hippy teeny bopper type clothing stores, Adidas, Topman, Burberry, Dior, Emporio Armani, Louis Vuitton Men and my absolute first time in an adult store, Condomania! LOL, nothing special in there except the Okamoto 0.02 (I've only seen 0.03 so this must be new) which is pathetically overpriced. We left Harajuku at around 11:30a and headed toward Shimbashi 新橋 in search for a shopping mall called Caretta Shiodome　カレッタ汐留 but was rather disappointed to find that it's not really a shopping mall, but a very tall building with too many restaurants over 8 of the 47 storeys. The "mall" is the home of the first commercial museum so we walked briefly through the exhibits. While trying to find the damn mall, we passed by the Nippon TV building 日テレビル and walked through the 2010 Shiodome Expo, consisting a bunch of kids playing games at a bunch of booths. I was so dehydrated I decided to stop by a Starbucks (knew I should have brought my loaded SB card) and downed quite the expensive venti sized cup of Yuzu Green Tea Frappucino. Oh, it was soooo refreshing! Somehow JP venti doesn't look like our venti... somewhat smaller in my opinion!

After the morning of walking, both Tinlop and I were so tired we decided to go back to the hotel to rest up (and stay out of the heat) before heading out again for dinner. Just when we got off the subway, Tinlop was hungry so we decided to head to the higher end department store Isetan to check out their food level. WOW and OMG!! Larger than any other I've seen so far, the place was PACKED with numerous 師奶's buying prepared foods and desserts. Amongst the hundreds of booths, I managed to see a Pierre Hermé counter!! OMG, I told myself if I saw one in Tokyo, I'd go in and buy ONE macaron to see what the hype is about with his renowned French creation. Of course I couldn't resist and bought three (couldn't buy any more, they were expensive!!) and it came with a cute little Pierre Herme ice pack that when defrosted, is actually an antiseptic! How ingenious is that? I picked Citron, Envie (cassis) and Rose. After snapping a kazillion photos of them back at the hotel, I finally bit into two of them and is saving the third one for later. O-M-G, they ARE yummy! The shells tastes just like the ones I make but the buttercream is sooo good!! Now I wanna make macarons again!

Now that it's almost 6:00p, I think I should get ready to head out for dinner! (5:51p)

お楽しみ旅行!

Jul.23.10 - 4:48p
What an eventful day so far! This morning started off at 4:15a when I just could not sleep any longer so I got up to finish blogging the previous day's events and tried to figure out where Tinlop and I would be headed for the day. We left at about 5:45a to head over to Tsukiji Market 築地市場. Since we didn't get there to line up at 4:30a, we couldn't go watch the great tuna auctions so we just wandered around the market looking for fresh fish for breakfast. I was disappointed to not find a single live fish at the market, but rather a lot of dried and pickled stuffs instead. Not to mention I was looking forward to eating live squid! Poo! We wanted to try out this recommended sushi place inside the market called Sushi Dai 寿司大 but the line up was out the door and then some! Plus breakfast at 3,600Y (over $48CAD) is just a teeny bit harsh for us frugal vacationers. Although I would have loved to try eating at a place where you don't have plates (eat off the bar) and the fish looked soooooo fresh! We opted for uni chirashi instead and it only cost 1,600Y. By the time we left the fish market, it was just after 8:00a.

We took the subway to a very deserted Ginza 銀座, walked up and down 2 blocks, decided we were not going to be able to stand the nasty heat (yes, at 8am!!) until 10am when the stores open, so we left and went to Asakusa 浅草 to do some massive touristy things like gawk at the big lantern at Sensoji Temple 浅草寺. There are small little booths selling souvenirs, yukatas, shaved ice etc. leading up the path to the temple along which we overheard very many free walking tourists speaking our very familiar dialect of Chinese. After melting a bit in the 9:30a sun, we left for the 鴨記 of Tokyo: Akihabara 秋葉原. This is the area to be if you want the newest and greatest in J-technology. Mind you, I didn't go see the innovations at Sony or Honda, but ended up in several electronic department stores just browsing. Did I mention it's hot here? After a quick kaiten sushi lunch near the JR Akihabara station, Tinlop and I decided to head back to the hotel and stay out of the sun for a bit. (5:58p)

Jul.23.10 - 10:37p
Left again at 7:30p to go see what it's all about to be gay in Tokyo by heading to Shinjuku Nichome 新宿二丁目, the hood to be if you're interested to see gay men of all ages... uh, ya. We saw a very old couple, like I mean OLD. Kinda weird. 四仔冇格仔 on posters of doors and sex shops... of men... hmm weird... the area wasnt' exactly bustling yet at the time so Tinlop got really bored so we left for the other place in town to be: Kabukicho 歌舞伎町. Now contrary to its homosexual counterpart, this hood was REALLY bustling with activity, BUT Tinlop got tired and hungry so we ended up walking to the nearest department store to get some last minute deals on cooked foods. I ended up with 6 slices of a really good snapper for 330Y and that was pretty much my dinner. Had some of the Choya 黑糖 plum wine I bought last night (super sweet) and Tinlop passed out. (10:49p)

東京に行きましょう!

Jul.21.10 - 1:46p
1:30pm take off time. 都算 on time bor! Thanks once again Tinlop for bringing me on yet another trip la! 都唔知幾開心!

This morning I got up at 7:50am-ish and finished my packing, took a shower and left with 文生 to hitch a ride with him down to Bayview Station. After so many years not having to take TTC, I felt like a free walker! Sigh... Got down to mommy's at 10:30am (!!) and left for the airport with Tinlop after a quick McD's cheeseburger takeout.

There are soo many open seats on this flight we couldn't get first class but hopefully we'll get on the direct flight back to TO where we are SURE we'd be in first! Kwaakakakaka!! Talk about being spoiled rotten! KWAH! Can't wait to see what the capital of the Land of the Rising Sun has in store for us for the next few days. Only thing I'm not looking forward to is the 33C+ weather that will be waiting for us when we land. Hope I don't melt like I did in Rome!

The FA's are now coming around with the first round of beverages and pretzels. (1:54p)

Jul.21.10 - 2:00p
The pretzels are actually Maized and Confused Corn Chips. What the hell does maized mean? and how confused can corn chips be? Probably not as confused as I am now. (2:02p)

Jul.21.10 - 2:50p
Just finished lunch of a really crappy (why am I even surprised?) beef teriyaki with soggy pet pet rice and a tomato cucumber salad. OMG, I'm really spoiled... food in first class is so much better! Learned something new today: alcohol is free in economy class on international flights. Didn't know that!

Jul.21.10 - 6:31p
Napped for a bit, but not really able to sleep lor. It's kinda chilly in the cabin and now I'm kinda hungry and extremely bored. (6:34p)

Jul.23.10 (4:32a local)
Dozed on and off in between watching episodes of 搜下留情 and snacked on my first ever Cup Noodle. "Breakfast" of congee and fruit was served about an hour and a half before landing at 1:00p Tokyo time which is 13 hours ahead of TO. So by the time we landed at Narita International Airport 成田国際空港 at 2:30p, we've already lost half a day!

Upon landing, Tinlop and I were greeted with a very clean airport and really nice people. Ahhh, such a polite and civilized country JP is! We passed through immigration quickly, having our fingerprints and photo taken and off we went to take the bus out into Tokyo! Local weather is hazy, humid and a whopping 33C but luckily (unlike our Roman Sweatbox Extravaganza of last year) our bus was VERY well air conditioned.

1 hour 45 minutes later, we arrived at Shinjuku Station 新宿駅 and quickly found our way to our lovely "cozy" hotel! If I recall correctly, the room is even smaller than the one in the love hotel mui and I stayed at in Osaka, LOL! We thought about switching to a now available twin room, but after one night decided against the hassle. After a quick shower and settling in, we headed out on our first rendezvous with Tokyo!

Our official first night in Tokyo saw us wandering around the Shinjuku Station area checking out the department store food levels, LOL, and eventually having some really yummy cold soba noodles for dinner. Afterward, we decided to head to Shibuya 渋谷 to check out the "Times Square" of Tokyo and wandered the surrounding area a bit before heading back to the hotel because both Tinlop and I had gone over 24 hours without much sleep (only a few hours on the plane).

Jasmine Ice Cream

I have so much to catch up on blog wise...sigh... not to mention I still have the journaling left to do for my last 2 scrapbook pages of my 2008 HK trip (gotta remind 細V about that 序). One blogger took 2 years to finally finish her 114-page book of her 2008 JP trip and I can't even get 39 pages done. Talk about procrastination. Sheesh.

文生's been having a lot of late nights at work this week (earliest he came home was 10:30pm) so while waiting for him for dinner tonight (he's still not home yet), I decided to make ice cream. So random eh? Well, I did want to make earl grey ice cream a few days ago. Not wanting to waste any of my loose leaf earl grey in case I screwed up (I haven't made ice cream in years), I decided to make jasmine flavoured ice cream. The mixture is cooling right now as I type so I'll just have to haul my arse downstairs to bring up the ice cream maker. It smells really good, but knowing what's in it makes me kinda sick. 1 cup milk, 2 cups heavy cream, 10 tablespoons of sugar, 6 egg yolks. That, translates to lots of fat, muchos cholesterol and too many calories. Eeek!

While stirring my mixture vigorously (as the recipe instructed), I remembered the ice cream 細V, 文生 and I had in Taiwan. Now I wanna add 當歸 to the list of flavours to make!

Where did July go?

I had to do a few double takes today while looking at the calendar at work. Something in the back of my mind told me what I'm seeing can't be right: it's July 12th today?!?!

Where the hell did the first two weeks of July go?

On another note, I'm super excited to try and make earl grey ice cream. Maybe while I have the ice cream maker out, I'll do HK tea ice cream and green tea ice cream too. OMG, the calories and the fat...

Random Facts

I received my Summer 2010 copy of the U of T Magazine in the mail yesterday and while I almost never flip through them, the small hamster print that read "Beijing Diary" caught my eye so I brought it to work. This is probably the reason why I still subscribe to the magazine that seems like a scientific journal more than a casual read to most people: I do read some of it... in a blue moon...

I flipped through the magazine scanning the pages and pages of print just barely big enough for hamsters to read (I guess you can probably read it unaided before the age of 40, I suppose) and came across an interesting science article (which happen to be the feature of this issue, not Beijing Diary LOL) and came across these somewhat intriguing facts about human infertility:

• Toronto has one of the country's highest concentrations of infertility experts (ya mun, we are the 權威!)
  
• Approximately one in six couples are affected by infertility
• Cancer treatments (chemotherapy, radiation and surgery) can compromise fertility
  
• Almost half of all pregnancies miscarry before six weeks (wah, that's a high number)
• Researchers identified more than 2,000 different proteins in semen, some of which may be markers for everything from prostate cancer to infertility
• Freezing sperm can leave it viable for at least 20 years but freezing eggs is more of a challenge
• Pierre Trudeau fathered a daughter at 71
  
• Oldest lady had twins at 66, who then died of cancer before her twins turned 3
• Studies show a higher rate of schizophrenia, autism, Down syndrome and other birth defects in children of older men, independent of mother's age
• Cost of each IVF (in vitro fertilization) treatment cycle is about $10,000 (so if it doesn't work this month, fork over another 10 big ones next month!)
  
• Quebec will fund up to three IVF cycles per patient (why just Quebec?!? While the rest of the country has to pitch it over)
• Women over the age of 41 has less than a 10 percent chance per IVF cycle of having a baby
  

- source: Parents - At Last!, Summer 2010 feature article, U of T Magazine

Flipping along, this book caught my eye:

ngap! What are you looking at?!? ngap!!

Sleepless Night

I've been pretty tired the last few days and not wanting to do anything as a result. Last night I made an attempt to sleep early and of course failed miserably. I do remember a really disgusting "nightmare" though: 炒小強. I was 炒ing away in the dream and most disgusted at the fact. Of course I didn't eat any, but remember giving one to Meishan to try who in turn told me: 未熟喎! Absolutely disgusting!!! I'm so sorry Meishan, to put you in my dream like that! I'm shuddering at the fact as I'm writing this!

I'd rather be drinking perfume... right, V?

Woke up this morning to a really really sore right arm. I must have slept on it weird...

Quaken by a Shake or Shaken by a Quake?

Us Torontonians felt a magnitude 5.0 earthquake earlier this afternoon and I thought it was me!! I was sitting in the office talking to a co-worker when I noticed my chair rumbling and my monitor shaking. Apparently, the epicentre is just north of Ottawa so we had our share of the shake. Although more nerves were shaken than buildings, people actually evacuated their workplaces. Just 10 minutes after the "tremor" we got an interoffice email telling us what to do in an environmental emergency. LOL~ Then came the "what to do during a tornado" email 10 minutes later. Yep, tornado warning is in store for us today as well. First an earthquake, then a tornado... sigh... life in TO!

I heard about the high winds this morning on the radio, but didn't expect it to be a tornado warning. I'm worrying about my tomato plants on my balcony now. Being two feet tall, I'm more afraid of them flying over the balcony than being torn out by the winds, although I'd really like them to survive! I stuck two arrows in them this morning to hold the plants up during high winds, but if they fly over the balcony, those arrows can really hurt. Hopefully the winds won't be too bad, or I shall have to move my planters inside for the night.

How Pathetic

I've been having problems with my netbook mouse lately so I finally decided to call Microsoft Support to see if I can get it fixed before the warranty expires. Called last Monday, was placed on hold forever and got cut off -_-"" Just my luck. Tried to send an email to support but their webpage kept giving me this stupid message:

"Our system is not responding right now. We apologize for the inconvenience. Our technical team has been alerted and is working on resolving the problem."

My ass. Their system has not worked ever since I tried for the first time 8 days ago. Typical Microsoft. So days pass and I didn't get to call back until now, so while I'm still on hold waiting for a "technical support rep" (who the hell did I call in the first place then?), I thought I'd jot down the contents of the pathetic conversation for the record.

MS: what are you calling about?
me: Microsoft Arc mouse.
MS: what is that?
me: a mouse.
MS: can you spell that please?
me: (wtf?) A-R-C m-o-u-s-e
MS: what brand is your Microsoft mouse? Dell? Toshiba?
me: (am I on the wrong planet?!?) uh, Microsoft?
MS: what brand is your computer?
me: Asus.
MS: Acer?
me: no, Asus.
MS: is it Acer?
me: (I'm not getting anywhere) no, it's Asus.
MS: can you spell that please? Is it a-c-e-r?
me: NO! a-s-u-s! Asus!
MS: did you buy your mouse with the computer?
me: no.
MS: where did you buy your mouse?
me: (what difference does it make?!?!) at a computer store.
MS: oh, a computer store. Nice. Please stay on the line while I retrieve some information.

25 minutes later...

MS: thank you for holding Ms. Joyce, I will have to transfer you to technical support. Please continue to hold...

Argh! At least the next hold was short and sweet. The hardware tech rep actually sounded like he knew what he was talking about and didn't talk to me like I was an idiot, although he did ask me if I put the batteries in correctly (*facepalm). After the entire fiasco, I should be getting a new mouse in 7-10 business days. Nice enough of him to remind me that I have 3 years warranty on the mouse instead of 1.

We'll see how long that one lasts...or if it ever gets here...

Sixteen Years

After 16 years of collecting Airmiles and not one single redemption, I finally made the 10K mark. Sigh....this is pathetic. Time to really think about redeeming it all before they either jack up prices even more or cancel the program altogether (hope that doesn't happen anytime soon).

食米唔知價之麥記 Hash Brown 篇

This morning I had to trek all the way to Scarborough in rush hour traffic and by the time I left Midland/Finch to head to work, my stomach started hurting because I was so hungry. Since I haven't had hash browns in so long, I thought I'd pick one up at McD's on my way back to the office. McD's is having their $1 any size drink again this summer so I thought perfect, I can grab a Coke too (yep, my morning coffee). Walked into the McD's at 7 and Valleymede and ordered my hash brown and medium Coke (what the hell, it's still a dollar; turned out it was still super sweet even with all that ice they put in there). Total came to $2.61 which I gladly paid. Then I did a double take. The hash brown is $1.49?!?!?! Since when?? The last I checked, they were $0.89!!

Tells you how long I haven't had McD's...

V's Birthday and a Bake-a-Thon

What a great way to celebrate a birthday....by making the birthday girl make her own cake, LOL~! Nah, we weren't that mean. Last Saturday we celebrated 細 V's big three oh and before we went out to dinner, 可可, 細 V and I hung out at my place and we made chocolate cupcakes and black sesame macarons! I gotta say, after 3 failed attempts, my hopes were pretty high for them hopeful macarights. Watching for the feet was soooo nerve-wracking!! When they formed, I was jumping up and down for joy, LOL! They actually look decent this time! Hoot!

After dinner, we went to 可可's place to decorate the 5 dozen cupcakes that we made and attempted marshmallow fondant for the first time. Surprisingly enough, it tastes okay~

Two Doors Opened to Two Bellinis Slurped

On Sunday, 可可 and her 蜜糖兔仔 organized a little itinerary to tour some of the places that were participating in Doors Open 2010 so along with 細 V, Gootoe, a couple of 可可's friends, 文生 and I tackled the CityTV/Omni station and the Elgin & Winter Theatre. Unfortunately, due to road closures and heavy traffic, we were kinda, um... late and didn't get to go to Redpath Sugar. I was pretty disappointed in the CityTV building as we didn't get to do much but sit around for a Rogers presentation despite waiting in line for about an hour. Looking back at the Doors Open photos from 2008, it seem like we did quite a bit more stuff than just wait in line, LOL~! Regardless, we had lots of fun chatting, baking in the sun, taking photos and catching up! Thanks to 可可 for organizing!

I'm still chuckling at the comment made by the 路人甲 waiting in line behind us while we were enjoying our vendor dogs, "唔係遊客都唔食熱狗喇!" Ya, we drove over an hour to get downtown since the highway was packed, so there's some truth to it I suppose.

Highlight of the afternoon was definitely the bellinis that we had a Milestones...yum! Slurped them up in no time. Very yummy! Can't wait for Saturday when we go celebrate 細 V's birthday at Moxie's where we can get it twice as big for a fraction of the price.

Probably the only thing I miss about living downtown is the great samples they give out at Dundas Square. Just before we left, we were given two bottles of VH cooking sauces, Vindaloo and Tikka Masala. I skimmed through the label and didn't quite like the idea of having to use the entire 341mL bottle of sauce to make just 4 servings of a dish (which equals only 2 servings for 文生 and I). After all, sauces are supposed to only compliment a dish, right? Well, maybe except pasta sauce, LOL. I'm usually not a fan of using cooking sauces since I don't believe you can get authentic flavours like you do from making things from scratch. I still don't get why people buy 李錦記 麻婆豆腐、宮保雞丁 sauces. It's so easy to make! Then again, not everyone likes keeping 18 different bottles of hot sauces in their fridge. LOL! That being said, I was determined to give the VH sauces a try. My hopes weren't exactly high when I used the Tikka Masala sauce to make lunch for today. Just finished it and my thoughts, meh... it's not very flavourful. Will probably not buy it again. Now I'm definitely not betting my pennies on the Vindaloo sauce.

I wonder how much these bottles retail for?